O C IRCUMSTANCE ! what ruin thou hast made
In Love's fair world we ever may behold
By the imaginative, gentle aid
Of woful stories by old poets told;
But this stern fact gives not philosophy
Sufficient to control the grieving heart,
From bearing thee a lover's enmity,
Because thou doom'st me from my love to part.
Ah! when I think, a little while ago
I gazed into those eyes of love and light,
And lived as though time would not onward go,
But, standing still for aye, feed our delight,—
Despair so grips me at a pleasure o'er

We watch'd him, while the moonlight,
Beneath the shadow'd hill,
Seem'd dreaming of good angels,
And all the woods were still.
The brother of two sisters
Drew painfully his breath:
A strange fear had come o'er him,
For love was strong in death.
The fire of fatal fever
Burn'd darkly on his cheek,
And often to his mother
He spoke, or tried to speak:
“I felt, as if from slumber
I never could awake:
Oh, Mother, give me something
To cherish for your sake!
A cold, dead weight is on me,
A heavy weight, like lead:

Fair Mary, thou art exquisite,
in all respects excelling;
since I gave such constant love to thee,
paying court to thee in every company,
I am trusting in thy graciousness
and what I have had of thy converse already,
that none can lure thee away from me,
after thy promise to me.

I have heard of oak, as an adage,
that it is a peculiar timber:
that 'tis a wedge of itself, being tightened,
would rive it into splinters;
I am hoping, by that principle,
thou art pleased I am of thy people,

Just one and thirty years, or (says one, I know who,)
Eleven thousand and Three hundred Twenty two
Whole Days & Nights are past, since we arrived here
At Phi-la-del-phi-a, where ye three Sisters dear,
In Love together link'd, still arm in arm do hold
Each other, as they paint the Charities of old.
Should mine Arithmetick proceed, & multiply,
(Like God his Blessings does,) it would (Be pleas'd to try,
And pardon when ye find an overly mistake,)
Of Minuts, Seconds call'd, most thousand Millions make.

Two thrushes met upon an April day,
And sang a simple song of love and glee:
… “And I am I, dear heart, and you are she
Whose tender note beguiled me on my way!”
They did not heed that all the sky was gray,
And not a neighbor leaf on any tree—
Two thrushes met upon an April day,
And sang a simple song of love and glee.

They did not miss the brightness of the May,
Or long the Summer's lavish wealth to see.
“April,” he chirped, “is fair enough for me,
And when you sing, lo, Spring is on the way”—
Two thrushes met upon an April day,

Sorry her lot who loves too well,
Heavy the heart that hopes but vainly,
Sad are the sighs that own the spell
Uttered by eyes that speak too plainly;
Heavy the sorrow that bows the head
When Love is alive and Hope is dead!

Sad is the hour when sets the Sun—
Dark is the night to Earth's poor daughters,
When to the ark the wearied one
Flies from the empty waste of waters!
Heavy the sorrow that bows the head
When Love is alive and Hope is dead!

They say Despair has power to kill
With her bleak frown; but I say No:
If life did hang upon her will,
Then Hope had perish'd long ago:
Yet still the twain keep up their “barful strife,”
For Hope Love's leman is, Despair his wife.

The air is charged with amatory numbers—
Soft madrigals, and dreamy lovers' lays.
Peace, peace, old heart! Why waken from its slumbers
The aching memory of the old, old days?

Time was when Love and I were well acquainted;
Time was when we walked ever hand in hand;
A saintly youth, with worldly thought untainted,
None better loved than I in all the land!
Time was, when maidens of the noblest station,
Forsaking even military men,
Would gaze upon me, rapt in adoration—
Ah me, I was a fair young curate then!

Far on the gray sea glooms and glowers,
Far off the salt winds vaguely stray,
And through the long monotonous hours
My thoughts go wandering on their way;

Go back to find that earlier time
When, lingering by a bluer sea,
A poet wooed me with his rhyme,
And all the world was changed for me.

The winds to music strange were set,
The sunsets glowed with sudden flame,
And all the shining sands were wet
With waves that whispered as they came,

And told a tender low-breathed tale
Of love that always should be young;

When worthless grandeur fills the embellish'd urn,
No poignant grief attends the sable bier;
But when distinguish'd excellence we mourn,
Deep is the sorrow, genuine is the tear.

Stranger! shouldst thou approach this awful shrine,
The merits of the honour'd dead to seek;
The friend, the son, the christian, the divine,
Let those who knew him, those who lov'd him, speak.

O let them in some pause of anguish say,
What zeal inflam'd, what faith enlarg'd his breast!
How glad th' unfetter'd spirit wing'd its way